Generally, in semiconductor manufacturing processes, after wafer-manufacturing processes are finished, non-defective products are selected through a probing test and received in packages, thereby completing final products.
Next, a burn-in process is carried out to a semiconductor device packaged as the final product.
In such a probing test, predetermined electrical signals are applied from a tester through probes of a probe card contacted with electrode pads of a chip formed on a semiconductor substrate, and then the electrical signals responding to the applied electrical signals are received again by the tester, so that it is checked whether the chip formed on the semiconductor substrate is normal or not.
As described above, the probe card for testing the completed wafer, that is, a semiconductor chip comprises, as shown in FIG. 1, a printed circuit board 110 provided with circuits, a reinforcement plate 112 formed at a center of a top surface of the printed circuit board 110, a probes 114′ contacted to the electrode pads of the wafer not shown, needles 14 connected to the circuits of the printed circuit board 110, a fixing plate 116 formed at a center of a bottom surface of the printed circuit board 110 to hold the probes 114′, and fixing members 118 for fixing the probes 114′ to the fixing plate 116.
At that time, a defined portion of the probe 114′ is bent downwardly, that is, toward the electrode pad by a predetermined angle.
The probes 114′ are contacted with central portions of the electrode pads with the probe card moving up down by mean of a jig not shown, so that it is checked whether the electrode pads are normal or not.
However, since the probes provided in the conventional probe card are a needle type and the defined portions of the probes are bent downwardly, that is toward the electrode pads by a predetermined angle, it is not easy to cope with the highly integrated semiconductor elements.
In other words, since the defined portion of the probes provided in the aforementioned probe card are bent downwardly, that is, toward the electrode pads by the predetermined angle, it is not possible to arrange the probes on the fixing plate of the probe card with high density, so that it is not possible to cope with the highly integrated semiconductor elements.
Further, since the needle type probes can slide on ball-type electrode pads widely used in recent years, that is, the ball-type electrode pads of which top surfaces are protruded upwardly, it is not easy for the needle type probes to be in contact with the ball-type electrode pads.
In addition, since the needle-type probes are formed through processes such as cutting and grinding of needles by means of manual works, there are problems that mass-production thereof is limited and difference in characteristics of the completed probes is generated depending upon proficiencies of workers.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a hollow microprobe using an MEMS technique and a method of manufacturing the hollow microprobe, the hollow microprobe being vertically fixed to cope with a fine pitch of a highly integrated semiconductor element.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a hollow microprobe using an MEMS technique and a method of manufacturing the hollow microprobe, in which the microprobe can be easily in contact with a ball-type electrode pad.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a hollow microprobe using an MEMS technique and a method of manufacturing the hollow microprobe, suitable for mass-producing reproducible products.